Sunday, August 29, 2010

This past Friday night I was able to see a band I never got a chance to see when I was a kid. Years ago on their second tour Asia had a live special on MTV called Asia in Asia. This was broadcast live from Japan and occurred the day before my 11th birthday. Here is a clip from that show that I stayed up until the wee hours of the night to see. They later broke up and went through numerous line up changes.Some 27 years later I was finally able to see the original line up live at Club Nokia. Strangely I had a number of friends independently at this show as well. So we had a good little group at the show with Natasha, myself, Brian and Jay (from my apartment), and another couple of friends of ours Liz and Steve.

The stage was minimal with only the instruments and a small video screen above the drums. The only thing the video was used for was to show the album cover for the song they were playing.

This was a surprisingly enjoyable show with a great vocal performance from John Wetton, an expectedly good drum solo from Carl Palmer and of course some great acoustic solos from Steve Howe of Yes fame.

For a low key show in a small venue this is probably one of the best theater shows I've been to in years. Great music, a great environment and a crowd that really showed respect for the music, which isn't something you see much as shows these days.

Monday, August 23, 2010

Well after having my car for nearly 7 years I decided it was time to get a new car. I wasn'tplanning on doing this right now, but after too many repairs this year, tires, alternator, belts, and then warning signs for a new clutch I decided to do what my Mom always did. When a car starts to break down, don't fix it, just trade it in for a new one. :-)

Here is one of the last pics of my old car and a couple of pics of the new one. Yes, it is basically a new version of my old one. Upgrading from a 2003 530i to a 2011 528i.I didn't think the drive and experience would be so drastic. My previous car was very nice and I had no complaints about the car it self. But this new car drives has both an amazing ride, and is decked out with outrageous technology. Starting with the navigation, smartphone, blue-tooth, and it even has a hard drive for time-shifting radio and for ripping CDs to your car. Some of these things I didn't even know they were doing.

The first road trip will be to Las Vegas in October. Can't wait.

Here is a link of the car I picked up today, down to the exact colors and options..

Tuesday, August 17, 2010

After 6 weeks of vacation I head back to work tomorrow. I'll be joining Gogii, a start up that currently builds a free texting application for smart phones call textPlus. I'll be their VP of Engineering and will be working to both improve their current product line and expand their portfolio of products and services. So on my last week off I had planned a little vacation and was able to see Rush twice on their Time Machine tour. First in Los Angeles and then at the world famous Red Rocks Amphitheater in Denver Colorado.

I went to the first show with my friend Brian

from Helio/Virgin/Sprint and who is also a resident of the lovely Mansfield Estates. I had just joined the House Of Blues Foundation Room so Brian and I were able to get access to the VIP area at the Los Angeles show. I had great seats and towards the end of the show I caught one of the shirts Geddy Lee threw into

the audience. The shirt featured Geddy on front dressed as the character from Gershon's that was the movie featured pre-show and during the intermission.

On Thursday I flew out to Denver to meet up

with Brett. I stayed at his place my first couple of nights and we took in a lot of mountain driving. First on the back roads to Manitou Springs and then after a couple of hours of driving our destination was rewarded with an old school video game arcade straight out of the 1980s. We played Tron, Asteroids, Joust, Galaga, Q-Bert, Donkey Kong, Donkey Kong Jr., Pole Position and maybe even a few others. We got the high scores on nearly every game we played with Brett taking the #1 spot on some and me #1 on others. EED and DAV lived on.

After a late night dinner with Brett and his wife Sandy, we headed back to Brett's for some late

night gaming on the Xbox 360. Friday Brett and I headed to Rocky Mountain National park. I had done this a few years back with the family when we there for Brett's wedding, but this was one thing I wanted to do again. We spent most of the day driving through the mountains and saw some Elk and Moose along the way. Took some great pictures and at the peak we were over 2 miles above sea level close to 13,000 feet.

Friday night concluded with another dinner and more Xbox gaming. We had a great time and although he turned 40 the following Monday I felt like I was able to be a part of his 40th birthday celebrations. Brett and Sandy were off to a family vacation on Saturday so I was dropped back off at the airport to meet up with Terry and Geoff, Terry's other brother in law.

Once we met up we headed to Matt's, a friend of Geoff's and had lunch at Cherry Cricket, as featured on Man Vs. Food, and then we took in a Colorado Rockies game at Coors Field with a pre-game event at Lodo's for a Texas Exes meet up. A little pre-game drinking with UT alumni.

We had a great time at the game even though the Rockies ended up losing. The game went into the 10th inning but at the end of the day the Milwaukee Brewers came out ahead.

On Sunday we took in brunch at a place called The Buff Restaurant in Boulder. We took in a tour of the Coors Brewery, saw the grave of Buffalo Bill and had dinner at another little place in Boulder.

That night Terry, Geoff and I got a hotel and did some late night drinking at Buffalo Wild Wings and topped the night off with some Coors (Yellow Belly) and Coors Light (Silver Bullet) back at the hotel. Listening to music, telling stories, and acting a lot like we did when we all lived in Austin when we were in college.

Monday was the primary reason for being in Denver. The Rush show at Red Rocks. After sleeping in we are started our day once again at the Buff Restaurant in Boulder. Afterwards we headed up to the Estes Brewery in Estes Park and took an air tram to the top of the hill above Estes Park. After a couple of hours of sight seeing we were off to see Rush.

Once at Red Rocks we walked around the park grounds and were able to hear Rush's soundcheck which featured the songs Presto, and Faithless. We met a number of people from out of town including a couple from Texas. A little rain shower and then a beautiful but faint rainbow emerged. And all of this happened about 30 minutes before the doors to the venue opened.

Once we got inside we all just took it in. The Rush show is always a great spectacle with great music and on this tour they were playing their best selling album, Moving Pictures, in its entirety. The Red Rocks show had some technical difficulties with the into movie and it seemed the high altitude might have given the band a couple of challenges during the set. A few missed cues here and there, which is odd for a Rush show, but nevertheless a great show and if you ever get a chance to goto Red Rocks then do so. A visually stunning venue.

Rush played the same set in both Los Angeles and Denver.

Rush

Setlist

The Spirit Of Radio

Time Stands Still

Presto

Stick It Out

Workin' Them Angels

Leave That Thing Alone

Faithless

BU2B

Freewill

Marathon

Subdivisions

Intermission

Tom Sawyer

Red Barchetta

YYZ

Limelight

The Camera Eye

Witch Hunt

Vital Signs

Caravan

Drum Solo

Guitar Solo -> Closer To The Heart

2112 / Temples Of Syrinx

Far Cry

Encore

La Villa Strangiato

Working Man

Tuesday morning Terry, Geoff and I all headed to the airport said our goodbyes. A great way to finish out my stretch of time off, and now after a great week of escape its back to reality.

Rush closed their show with a song called Working Man. So as I start my new job on Wednesday and it's time to "Call Me The Working Man".

I took quite a few pictures so here are links to the different photo albums from the trip.